Evolution in the form of selective breeding has long been harnessed as a useful tool by
humans. However, rapid evolution can also be a danger to our health and a stumbling block …

Natural transformation and homologous recombination in a soil bacterium, Acinetobacter
baylyi ADP1, occur with exceptionally high efficiency. These genetic features can be …

Bioavailable nitrogen is the limiting nutrient for most agricultural food production. Associative
diazotrophs can colonize crop roots and fix their own bioavailable nitrogen from the …

One goal of synthetic biology is to improve the efficiency and predictability of living cells by
removing extraneous genes from their genomes. We demonstrate improved methods for …

Spontaneous mutagenesis of synthetic genetic constructs by mobile genetic elements
frequently results in the rapid loss of engineered functions. Previous efforts to minimize such …

Riemerella anatipestifer is a gram-negative bacterium that is the first naturally competent
bacterium identified in the family Flavobacteriaceae. However, the determinants that …

Metabolic engineering can be used as a powerful tool to redirect cell resources towards
product synthesis, also in conditions that are not optimal for the production. An example of …

For many years, the natural competency of Acinetobacter baylyi ADP1 facilitated studies of
bacterial metabolism, biochemistry, and physiology. With the advent of synthetic biology …

Diverse applications rely on engineering microbes to carry and express foreign transgenes.
This engineered baggage rarely benefits the microbe and is thus prone to rapid evolutionary …

Engineered microbes often suffer from reduced fitness resulting from metabolic burden and
various stresses. The productive lifetime of a bioreactor with engineered microbes is …